In recent years, with the spread of mobile devices such as smartphones, applications that use location information have become popular. In general, a global positioning system (GPS) positioning method and a positioning method using a wireless local area network (LAN) connection service are known as a method for determining location information. However, a base station positioning method that consumes less power is used for the mobile devices and the like.
The base station positioning method is a method that estimates the location of a mobile device, based on the location of a serving base station captured by the mobile device and the location of a neighboring base station. For example, a mobile device acquires ID information from a base station captured by the mobile device. The mobile device also acquires ID information from a base station in the vicinity of the captured base station. The mobile device then transmits the acquired ID information to a server and acquires location information, which is estimated by the server from the ID information. Examples are disclosed in Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 2004-361412 and Japanese Laid-open Patent Publication No. 02-044929.
However, the base station positioning method estimates the location information of a mobile device by only using the location information of the base station. Hence, the accuracy of the location information is not sufficient. Also, because the positioning method using GPS or wireless LAN consumes large power, it is not suitable for the mobile device the size of which has been reduced and the performance of which has been improved.